Page 19 of Devoured

And if you start spending time with him again, I think, I won’t have to see either of you as much.

“He doesn’t want to speak to me.” Sin drops onto his chair with a sigh. “He’s made that clear.”

“You won’t fight for him?”

His jaw tightens. “I did fight for him. I did everything for him.”

“You lied to him about his true birth mother—”

“I wasn’t allowed to tell him!”

“—and then you killed her,” I finish. “You owe him an apology. No matter your reasoning, you shattered his world and then set it on fire.”

Sin sits for a moment, silent and frozen, and somewhere in the distance, Oona laughs. My muscles clench. My stomach roils, but I force myself to continue. To dig in the knife. “He loves you, Sin. He’ll forgive you. Just try.”

He glances up, and his gaze flashes. His voice sharpens. “Do you forgive me?”

“No,” I admit—because he won’t believe anything else. “But one day, I will.”

“Right.” He leans back in his chair, kicking his feet up on his desk, a lazy air of arrogance and privilege sweeping through the room. He waves a hand toward the right, where an arched crevice in the wall is adorned with a single bronze knob. “Your room,” he says blandly. “I assume if you came in through my room that you don’t have a doorway on the outside.”

Don’t… have… a doorway?

Instantly, I understand. I’ll have to come through Sin’s room anytime I want to enter or exit. My blood boils. Cora trapped me here. Trapped me here with her son just so she can make me miserable. So she can watch me, stalk me, track me. So she can make certain I’m adhering to her every whim. My pulse speeds up, and Sin’s gaze flicks to my chest as though he can feel my sudden fury.

I don’t bother repressing the anger from my voice. “Don’t you see that she’s torturing me? Why else would she do this to both of us? We need our own space.” God, I can’t be this close to him. Not now. “Can’t you tell her—”

“I’ve talked to her, Vanessa. I’m doing what I can. She doesn’t mean you any harm—I swear it.” His princely facade fades, until he sounds like my Sin again. Which must be another of his lies. My Sin never existed in the first place. “Please give me time to fix this. I won’t disturb you. I’ll make sure I’m not in my room when you wish to enter your own. I’m on your side.” His voice softens further, into a gentle murmur that almost sounds warm—like love. “I’ll always be on your side.”

I lift my chin. If only because I can’t stand here and take this agony anymore, I say, “I don’t trust your mother, Sin. And if you were smart, you wouldn’t either.”

Without waiting for a response, I leave the room—his, mine, ours—and slam the door shut behind me.

8

VANESSA

EVIE AND I MEET ON THE NORTHERN STAIRWELL JUST after midnight. Cloaked in black, a hood covering everything but the Alpha red of her gaze, she could almost be a shadow. Claws rip free from the tips of her black gloves, and I know her canines have lengthened too. She’s prepared for anything. We both are.

“Five guards on the fourth floor,” I say quietly—no louder than a breath—as nerves blister my stomach as if I’ve swallowed a flame. “They patrol the corridor and rotate positions every half hour. Their shifts never change.”

She nods once before spraying me with some sort of scent-masking perfume. A creation of her own, I’m sure. “And what about in front of the records room?”

I frown and push my tightly braided hair behind my shoulder. Unlike Evie, I didn’t have an espionage outfit on hand for this, so I’ve settled for the usual long-sleeved spandex of winter training and combat. “I don’t know. No one ever told me about the records room.”

Eyes rolling, she huffs and stuffs the perfume back in her pocket. Her claws flex. She doesn’t seem nervous at all. “I keep forgetting how new you are.”

There, beneath her words, I sense her true meaning: “I keep forgetting how useless you are.” But she doesn’t say it, and I don’t argue in response. Although I’d much prefer our short conversations and silent misery from the antechamber, this isn’t the time to remember that Evie and I aren’t friends. That we’re barely even acquaintances. As of now, she is the only person in this castle I can trust. So I stare at her and wait for her to elaborate.

“Fourth door on the left,” she mutters. “The tapestry of a wolf swallowing the sun used to hang above it.”

Oh. Immediately, I know the doorway. It was one of the first that changed under Cora’s command. “Amethyst guards it. She patrols the doorway and the corridor on her own as a wolf.”

“Good. I’m glad it’s her.” Evie starts forward, but I clasp her wrist and pull her back.

“Remember, Evie, we—we can’t kill her. Amethyst is Cora’s third-in-command.” I think of Jasper, his hot breath and revolting words, and shudder. “If Amethyst dies, Cora will investigate. If Cora investigates, we’re doomed.” We have to be careful tonight.

“Amethyst has been starving and beating Lyra,” Evie snaps, her words sharpening on a hiss. “She deserves worse than death.”